Guru's Verification engine ensures consistency, confidence, and trust in the knowledge your organization shares. Learn more.

Canvas: Backing Up Your Content

As part of our commitment to protecting academic materials and ensuring continuity of teaching and learning, we encourage all faculty, staff, and students to regularly back up important content stored in Canvas. Maintaining personal backups of critical course materials is considered a best practice.

For Faculty and Staff

Faculty and staff can export entire Canvas courses, download individual files, and save gradebook data for safekeeping.

Option 1: Export an Entire Canvas Course

Exporting your course creates a downloadable package containing course content such as assignments, pages, quizzes, modules, discussions, and files.

To export a course:

  1. Open your course in Canvas.
  2. Select Settings from the course navigation menu.
  3. Click Export Course Content on the right side of the page.

canvasexport.png

  1. Choose Course as the export type.
  2. Click Create Export.
  3. Once processing is complete, click New Export to download the file.

newexport.png

Note: The downloaded file type is for use in a Learning Management System like Canvas or other similar services. This process is good for backup purposes only. Once you no longer need the content, it is safe to delete.

Recommended: Store exported course files in a secure storage location such as Google Drive or a department shared drive.

Option 2: Download Course Files

To back up uploaded files separately:

  1. Open your Canvas course.
  2. Select Files from the course navigation.
  3. Use the available download options to save important documents, presentations, and media files locally.

download.png

Option 3: Export the Gradebook

To save a copy of student grades:

  1. Open your course.
  2. Select Grades from the course navigation.
  3. Click Export.
  4. Choose Export Entire Gradebook.

export.png

A CSV file containing grade data will download to your computer.

Recommended Faculty Backup Practices

We recommend faculty and staff:

  • Export active courses at least once per semester
  • Download gradebooks regularly during the term
  • Maintain copies of critical instructional materials outside Canvas
  • Store backups in secure university-approved storage platforms

For Students

Students can download copies of submitted assignments, course files, and other important academic materials from Canvas.

Download Submitted Assignments

To save copies of your submissions:

  1. Open Canvas.
  2. Click your profile image and select Settings.
  3. Click the Download Submissions button on the right side of the page.

studentdownload.png

  1. Click Create Export.
  2. Once processing is complete, click New Export to download the file.

Download Course Files

Some instructors make course files available for download.

  1. Open your course.
  2. Select Files.
  3. Download important study materials, syllabi, lecture slides, or handouts.

Save Important Course Information

Students are encouraged to save:

  • Assignment submissions
  • Research papers and projects
  • Discussion post drafts
  • Feedback from instructors
  • Course syllabi and study materials

Additional Recommendations

  • Store backups in multiple locations when possible.
  • Do not store sensitive or restricted university information on unsecured personal devices.

For additional support, please contact: SAS@newschool.edu.

You must have Author or Collection Owner permission to create Guru Cards. Contact your team's Guru admins to use this template.